


Jekyll & Hyde

by colorcoded



Category: Aladdin (1992), Sleeping Beauty (1959), The Lion King (1994), The Little Mermaid (1989)
Genre: Community: disney_kink, Gen, Identity Issues
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-13
Updated: 2017-07-25
Packaged: 2018-12-01 19:10:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,424
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11492826
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/colorcoded/pseuds/colorcoded
Summary: Short vignettes of Disney movies where the villain is actually an aspect of the hero all along.





	1. Sleeping Beauty

**Author's Note:**

> For [this prompt](http://disney-kink.dreamwidth.org/1523.html?thread=3965171#cmt3965171) at [disney_kink](http://disney-kink.dreamwidth.org/): "The villain in one of the [Disney] movies doesn't exist as their own entity, in the strictest sense of the word. They are the alter ego of the hero or heroine, created as an outlet for the darkest side of them, allowing the bright, innocent characteristics to flourish."

### Sleeping Beauty

With an impassive face, Aurora watched as Flora placed a crown upon her head. She had meant to hold her tears in but after a moment it became too much and she collapsed into quiet sobs. Quiet sobs were evidently the only act of revolution that Briar Rose had the stomach for. Vaguely she was aware of her aunts behind her shuffling awkwardly. In the mirror, they exchanged apologetic looks and then quietly left the room.

Rose was a good girl who hardly complained, and who thought that just _dreaming_ of meeting strangers was somehow a grand act of rebellion. Rose was a dutiful girl who, though she had cried out her heartbreak on her pillow, had put on the traveling cloak they had told her to put on, had walked the road that led to the castle, had worn the crown they said belonged to her without a single word of complaint.

Sometimes, she hated being Rose.

Long ago, her aunts had told her a tale of a princess cursed by an evil fairy. Maleficent, she was named, and she had cursed the newborn princess merely because the king and queen had not invited Maleficent to her christening. _And now I am a princess too. Was the cursed one me?_

Briar Rose had often wondered what kind of fairy this Maleficent must be. She was selfish, Rose had decided. Childish. She had to have her way, and when she didn't, she raged like only a fairy can rage. People hurried to appease her. Not like Rose, silly Rose who lived to make others happy.

Sometimes, she wished she could be Maleficent.

She wondered what Maleficent would do in her situation. Whatever she damn well pleased, most likely, and no one would think to stop her. As if in a trance, Aurora rose from her seat slowly, an idea flickering in her mind. She flung open dressers filled with clothing, found jars of colored powder. In just a few minutes she had changed into a black robe, its sleeves ripped and hanging in tatters. Her face, she had covered in a monstrous green color.

As she hurried out into the corridor and down a flight of stairs, she came across her aunts.

"Your Highness?" Flora said. "Rose! What did you...?"

Maleficent gave a low chuckle. "You fools. Princess Aurora is fast asleep. Now out of my way." She brushed past them and strode outside to the stables, her robe billowing out behind her as she walked. She hurried to saddle a horse as her fairy aunts came running after her.

"Rose! Rose, no!" Merryweather begged.

Pulling herself astride her horse, Maleficent sneered. "Your beloved princess is gone now."

And with that she kicked the horse into a gallop and was off toward the wood, to the cottage where she had been raised and where she had promised to meet her love. In the shadows she waited for him, and when the door creaked open at last, Maleficent stood, a coil of rope in one hand.

She wanted the handsome young man more than anything. And Maleficent always got what she wanted.


	2. Aladdin

### Aladdin

When his mother was alive, she used to tell Aladdin all sorts of stories, of ancient treasure and magical relics. His favorite of all the tales was the story of the genie's lamp lost at the bottom of a wondrous cave. As he grew, so did his obsession with the lamp. Three wishes... the glory possible if he had any three wishes! Many a time, his mother had caught him staring idly at the sultan's palace, head filled with daydreams of luxury and servants to heed his every order and guards that watched over him every minute instead of chasing him through the streets.

"Aladdin, life has many treasures far more important than wealth and glory," her mother had scolded him once. "Your fool father never could understand that. I want you to be different."

She died shortly after, and although something inside Aladdin still burned with the desire to leave Agrabah and set off across the sands in search of the lamp, he gave up those dreams out of respect for her.

He wasn't sure quite how it started, but at some point he must have stared at the palace and thought, "If I only had the lamp, I would wish to be the sultan." Upon realizing what thought had just run through his head, he had felt ashamed for a moment and so had joked that it wasn't _he_ who thought it but the greedy, single-minded Jafar.

Since then, Aladdin was only allowed wistful glances at the palace and wishing for a better life filled with love and happiness. Any thoughts of what it would be like to be a sultan and command men and women alike to serve his every whim, or of a certain lamp lying at the bottom of a deep cave -- those were attributed to Jafar.

Oddly, over time, as Jafar became more defined, the two began to get more polarized, separate. Aladdin gave anything he could spare to urchins with even less than he had. Jafar did not even see the destitute children that filled the slums of Agrabah, so wrapped in his own mind was he. Aladdin's desires were vague and unformed, while Jafar was singularly obsessed with the lamp and his dream of becoming powerful. To Aladdin, this life on the streets was all he knew, all he cared about. To Jafar, the whole world was his, to explore as he pleased. Jafar was a scheming, ambitious man; Aladdin was straightforward and had his own sense of honor.

Jafar learned his letters, searched the city for old tomes, studied everything there was to know about magic and magical beings and artifacts. Painstakingly, Jafar had found how to open the Cave of Wonders, a cave that Aladdin had not given a single thought to since his mother passed away. And it was Jafar who discovered that the cave required a diamond in the rough, a pure-hearted yet unrefined soul. Jafar was afraid to enter the cave, knowing that his ambition and ruthlessness had tainted his soul years ago.

But _Aladdin_... Aladdin was a selfless, good young man. Jafar just knew that _Aladdin_ would be able to enter the cave.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I like that I was able to work a bit of _Aladdin and the King of Thieves_ / Aladdin's dad into this short fic.


	3. The Little Mermaid

### The Little Mermaid

Triton found his youngest daughter in her bedroom, staring blankly at her reflection in a glass. Upon hearing him enter, she turned, then gave him a baleful look before turning back to her mirror once more.

"Ariel, we need to talk," Triton began.

Her only response was to hurtle past him, out of her room and into the castle.

"Ariel, don't you swim away from me!" he said, voice rising with anger. "ARIEL!"

She continued down the hallway as fast as her tail would propel her and was soon out of sight. Triton let out an angry sigh. He felt guilty about what he had done to her grotto but anytime he tried to speak to Ariel about it, she would storm off and refuse to utter a single word to him. Whenever that happened, anger and frustration came to him easier than guilt and apology.

"Your Majesty?" came a small, nervous voice.

It was Sebastian -- just the person Triton wanted to see. "Help me, Sebastian. What can I say to her? I just want her to be safe. Why can't she see that? How can I make her understand how truly barbaric these humans are?"

Put on the spot, Sebastian gulped nervously, searching for some good advice. "Maybe... Maybe dat's somet'ing she needs to find out herself?" he said at last.

"By getting snagged on some fisheater's hook?" Triton replied angrily. "I don't think so."

"But de girl has always dreamed of being a human. If you gave her de chance, she would see what it's really like to be one."

"Without being hunted by one of them..." Triton mulled over the idea for a few long moments. If, for just a few days, he let her meet this prince of hers, she would realize just what kind of creature he was... If the prince showed he was capable of true love, Triton could admit that Ariel was right about him -- about _all_ humans. Otherwise, she would know for herself just how faithless and barbaric these humans were.

"But she refuses to talk to me," Triton mused aloud. He couldn't get two words in without both he and his daughter getting angry at each other. "How can I..." He paused. He had an idea.

* * *

"A message from Ursula the sea witch, who makes dreams come true," the eels said to the young princess. "You dream of being human, do you not? Then come with us and we will take you to her."

Ariel wiped the tears from her face to look up at her visitors. _A sea witch?_ She knew only fools or the desperate asked for the spells of a sea witch. _Perhaps I'm both._ "Wait," she said as the eels began to swim off. "I'm coming."

* * *

The witch laid down the terms. No voice, three days, true love's kiss, or she would be in the witch's power forever.

"Do we have a deal, child?"

Ariel signed, and then was blindfolded with a band of seaweed. With a blast of magic from the king's trident, Ariel's tail split into two legs, and she swam to the surface, taking her first gasping breath as a human.

"She really wants to do this, doesn't she?" Ursula said, rubbing her forehead wearily.

"Your Majesty?" came the small voice of Sebastian.

"Follow her, Sebastian," Ursula commanded. As she spoke, she made a gesture with the trident and her form changed back to that of the sea king. "Above everything, keep her safe." He just hoped that Ariel could handle the heartbreak.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one is a bit of a departure from the prompt since it's not the main hero doubling as the main villain, and the villain isn't an outlet of darkness. But I think Triton and Ursula mirror each other in interesting ways (for example, both being _capable_ of turning Ariel human but either not willing to (Triton) or only willing to do so conditionally (Ursula)). Ariel/Vanessa is also a good mirroring, but I'm not sure how to make that one work, plot-wise.


	4. The Lion King

### The Lion King

That day in the gorge had changed his life forever. His father had died that day and it was entirely Simba's fault -- what he thought was just a funny prank had turned out to be a foolish act with disastrous consequences. When he realized what he'd done, he had run, away from his father's carcass and his own unutterable guilt, tears and blood streaming down his face.

A lone cub in the savanna could not catch food and would soon be a meal for a large hunter. Yet a clan of hyenas had found him several days later, and instead of killing him, had decided to raise him as one of their own. "Hey," the matriarch had said over the protests and mocking laughter of the rest of the clan, "he might come in handy one day." It took several weeks for Simba to come out of his shocked silence, and by then, the cut on his face that he had gotten from a wildebeest hoof had begun to heal and the hyenas had taken to calling him Scar.

Years later, he was able to repay the debt he owed to the hyenas when he killed the lion who had assumed leadership of Pride Rock. "This is the beginning of a new order," he had said to his old pride that day, his eyes lingering for a brief moment on the familiar face of his mother, and then quickly away before she recognized him. "An order where lion and hyena work side-by-side!"

A lioness snarled incredulously, but her voice was drowned out by the cheers of the hyenas -- "Long live King Scar! Long live King Scar!"

* * *

"Can I have a word with you, Scar?" Nala stood at the mouth of the cave, her voice filled with annoyance.

"Sure," Scar said, shooing the hyenas out of the cave with a motion of his paw. "How did the hunt go?"

"That's what I wanted to talk to you about," Nala replied. "We're overhunting food that's already scarce. The hyenas are eating too much, draining too many resources. At this rate, we'll need to leave Pride Rock, find another hunting ground... Scar?"

He was hardly paying attention to her words because for the first time he realized that she was in heat. Nala had been Simba's best friend when he was young, and Scar's most vocal critic ever since he had returned to the pride, but now all Scar could think of was what it would be like to mate with her. He pressed himself up against her, but she backed away, narrowing her eyes warily. "What are you doing?" she asked. So cautious, so guarded.

He backed her toward a corner, leaped at her, tried to pin her down. She responded with tooth and claw, and the struggle began. They rolled and tossed on the ground until somehow it was Nala on top, slamming Scar's head into the ground.

A look of recognition came over Scar's face -- over both their faces -- as wrestling matches from long ago drifted into their minds, and the look was not missed by the perceptive lioness.

"Simba...?" she asked.

He should have denied it, but instead he just pushed her off and muttered, "Not anymore."

"It _is_ you then. I can't believe it," she said, her voice almost tender. But then it was cold again. "Simba... What _happened_ to you? How can you just let the hyenas do whatever they like to this place?"

"I owe them my life, okay? I would have died without them."

"Do you owe them all our lives too? Because if you don't stop them, _we'll_ die. All of us. If Mufasa were here, I know he would have--"

"NEVER say that name," Scar snapped. The name of his father was salt in a wound that he had never properly tended.

"Then wake up, Simba! This place is a wasteland compared to what it was before!"

"Stop calling me that," Scar said. "The Simba you knew died a long time ago."

Nala was silent for a few moments, studying him, disapproval written on her face. "Clearly he did," she said before slinking out of the cave.

Scar found out the next day that she had deserted the pride, bounding off towards the east. Three months passed before he saw her again, when she padded up to Pride Rock in daylight as casually as if she had just returned from an ordinary hunt. But there was a glimmer of hope in her eyes, and that night Scar had a visit from a very eccentric mandrill.

"Who are you?" Scar asked the intruder.

"The question is," the mandrill replied, "who are _you?"_


End file.
